International Monetary Fund. Monetary and Capital Markets Department
This Technical Assistance Report discusses the recommendations made by the IMF mission to assist Uganda in moving toward risk-based supervision of insurance sector. It highlights that under the revised insurance legislation, the Insurance Regulatory Authority of Uganda (IRA) will be requiring nonlife insurers to provide certification for adequacy of technical provisions by an actuary as is currently required for life insurers. When the requirement comes into effect, it will be necessary for it to be supported by guidance from IRA in terms of its expectations for the actuarial reports to be filed. This will ensure consistency in reporting to the IRA and that the reports will provide the information needed by the IRA for supervisory purposes.
We use the Synthetic Control Method to study the effect of IMF advice on economic growth, inflation, and investment. The analysis exploits the existence of IMF programs that do not involve any financing (Policy Support Instruments, “PSIs”). This enables us to focus on the effects of IMF monitoring, advice, and approval (as opposed to direct financial assistance). In addition, countries with non-financial programs are typically not crisis-struck – thereby mitigating the reverse causality problem and facilitating the construction of counterfactuals. Results suggest that treated countries add about 1 percentage point in annual real GDP per capita growth, with inflation being lower by some 3 percentage points per year. While we do not find evidence for an impact on total investment and the resulting capital stock, PSI-treatment does seem to stimulate foreign direct investment.